Legitimacy and sincerity as leveraging factors in social sponsorship: an experimental investigation

Abstract

The research presented in this manuscript examines how social sponsorship can be made more commercially effective. To this end, the effects of two leveraging factors are explored by means of an experiment: the extent to which the social sponsorship is seen by consumers as legitimate, and that to which the sponsor is perceived as sincere. The results show that these two factors have a positive and statistically significant impact on consumers’ intentions to purchase the sponsor’s products. In addition, they show that the sponsor’s perceived sincerity increases when the sponsorship is combined with philanthropic investments, either in sequence (i.e. philanthropy followed by sponsorship) or simultaneously, and that the legitimacy of a sponsorship is enhanced when the cause and its sponsor are congruent. These results are discussed in the context of the literature on social sponsorship, and managerial implications for firms that contemplate using social sponsorship as a marketing communication strategy are derived.

Keywords:

• Sponsorship
• social sponsorship
• legitimacy
• sincerity
• congruence

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Although the majority of L’Oréal’s products target women, gender did not moderate in a statistically significant way any of the relationships proposed in the conceptual model. The full results are available from the first author upon request.

2 http://rbcraceforthekids.com/.

3 http://www.rbc.com/community-sustainability/community/index.html.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Alain d’Astous

Alain d’Astous (PhD, University of Florida) is Professor of Marketing at HEC Montréal, Canada. His research interests center on marketing communication and consumer behavior.

François Anthony Carrillat

Dr. François A. Carrillat (PhD, University of South Florida) is Associate Professor in the Department of Marketing, Business School, at the University of Technology Sydney. Dr. Carrillat’s research interests include sponsorships, endorsements, advertising, consumer welfare, and marketing strategy.

Audrey Przybysz

Audrey Przybysz (MSc, HEC Montréal) is New Business Director at Kantar France. During her marketing research career, she has worked on a wide range of subjects – including advertising and sponsorship effectiveness, market segmentation, and concept testing – for companies in many different industries (from luxury to banking services).